SAY HELLO TO THE ROBO WORKER
Chairman, Maruti Suzuki India
Robots are used in shop floors not to reduce employment but to grow total employment by increasing competitiveness and sales
Right from when I started working with the government in 1956, the approach has been that India must adopt labour intensive methods in manufacturing industries. The logic was that our large population and abundance of low-cost labour would help us manufacture goods at low cost. Quite predictably, labour unions opposed any form of automation or use of technology in factories that would lead to additional jobs not being created.
Everyone is aware that manufacturing in India has stagnated at 15-16 per cent of GDP while some of the bigger countries in Asia with high economic development are at 35-40 per cent. The expectation that labour intensive production would make products more saleable due to lower cost has not been
